Monday, May 1, 2017

Which countries voted for Saudi Arabia to be elected to the UN women's rights commission?

Red Pilled World recently reported on the disturbing news that the UN have elected Saudi Arabia to their women's rights commission, apparently ignoring the oppressive and inhuman conditions Saudi Arabian women are forced to live under1, and despite the fact that Saudi Arabia ranks 141 out of 144 in gender equality in the World Economic Forum’s 2016 Global Gender Gap report.2

On previous occasions the UN's Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) has rubber-stamped nominations arranged behind closed doors, as was the case in 2014 when the Obama administration3 allowed Iran4 to be elected to the women's rights commission by acclamation. However, this time the U.S. forced a formal vote.

Sadly, this didn't change the end result, as 47 of the 54 member states of the council voted in favor of Saudi Arabia being elected to the women's rights commission. This vote was carried out by secret ballot5, no doubt to protect the countries who voted in favor of Saudi Arabia from embarrassment.

However, despite the secret ballot, we know that only 7 countries voted against Saudi Arabia. By following simple logic, we can therefore work out that at least 6 of the following 13 European countries6 on the council voted to elect Saudi Arabia to the U.N.’s women’s rights commission:

The question is, who were those countries who betrayed the women of Saudi Arabia?

Belgium have admitted they voted in favor of Saudi Arabia 'by mistake'7 but most countries have so far refused to reveal how they voted. Sweden is one of those countries which has remained silent, so in response, and in accordance with their pursuit of openness, Wikileaks have offered a €10K reward8 for evidence on how Sweden voted.

The Swedish government, who had previously declared themselves to be the 'world's first feminist government in the world', betrayed Iranian women by wearing hijabs when they met the Iranian president9, so perhaps that was why Wikileaks have singled out Sweden for attention.

Of course some have pointed out that Julian Assange has a personal reason for wanting to embarrass Sweden by drawing attention to the Swedish government's hypocrisy on women's rights. However, that doesn't change the fact that there are two possibilities:

* If Sweden voted against Saudi Arabia they can reveal their vote and avoid embarrassment.
* If Sweden voted in favor of Saudi Arabia their only option is to remain quiet and hope the truth doesn't come out.

So far the Swedish government has remained quiet.

Once again though, Sweden isn't the only country to remain quiet on the secret ballot. Public pressure needs to be brought against all of the countries on the council who refuse to reveal how they voted. Credit to the 7 countries who voted against Saudi Arabia, but the 47 countries who voted in favor of Saudi Arabia need to be publicly embarrassed.